Mitsuteru Yokoyama

(18 June 1934 - 15 April 2004, Japan)

Mitsuteru Yokoyama was a famous mangaka. Between 1956 and 1966 he drew 'Tetsujin 28-go', the first manga starring a giant robot, which was published in Shonen by Kobunsha. He created the superhero 'Akakage' in 1967, which became especially famous through the TV anime show. He also illustrated one of the first magical girl manga's, called 'Sally the Witch', which ran in Ribon in 1966-67. In the early 1970s, Weekly Shonen Champion published Yokoyama's serial 'Babel II', starring a Japanese schoolboy who is a reincarnation of an alien entity.

His best known work is the sixty volumes 'Sangokushi', a retelling of the 15th Chinese historical novel 'Romance of the Three Kingdoms', that was published in Ushio Shuppansha's Comic Tom between 1971 and 1986. Yokoyama furthermore created 'Princess Comet', 'Suiko-den' and an adaptation of the classic Chinese novel 'Outlaws of the Marsh'. Nearly all of his works have been adapted to anime. The artist died in a fire at his home in Tokyo.